Former Indian opener Navjot Singh Sidhu believes India lacked bowling depth in the recently concluded Border-Gavaskar series, which the visitors lost by 1-3 against Australia. Sidhu reckons a fit Mohammed Shami could have helped India in winning the third consecutive series on Australian soil.
Jasprit Bumrah was the lone warrior for the tourists, snaring 32 wickets in five Test matches at an average of 13.06 and thus bagged the Player of the Series award. Siraj was the supporting bowler but he scalped 20 wickets at an average of 31.15 whereas Harshit Rana and Akash Deep could not deliver consistently.
Sidhu feels it could have been a different story altogether if Shami had been available for the Australia tour. Shami could not join the squad as he failed to attain full fitness after recovering from a knee injury.
Navjot Singh Sidhu said on Sports Tak, “They [Australia] had three experienced bowlers for those conditions and you had only one fast bowler. The support was Mohammed Siraj. He is a tremendous bowler but if there was Mohammed Shami, you might have won the series. They kept attacking the weakest link.”
On the other hand, Jasprit Bumrah bowled a total of 153.2 overs on the Australia tour and in the end, he was ruled out of the second innings at the SCG due to a back injury.
Speaking on Bumrah, Sidhu said, “The solution is you keep formats specialists. Do rotation. Why is it important? It’s because Bumrah bowled 386 overs in a year. If you keep a lot of sacks on an Arab horse, will it win the race? It will fall 100 percent. If you squeeze lemon too much, it will give bitter juice. This is a short-term treatment.”
India will next host England for five T20Is and three ODIs.
